FIG. 1 depicts telecommunications terminal 100 (e.g., a wireless telephone, a whirling telephone, a personal digital assistant [PA], etc.) in the prior art. Telecommunications terminal 100 is capable of receiving messages (e.g., incoming voice call notifications, email messages, Short Message Service [SIS] messages, Multimedia Message Service [MMS] messages, Instant Messaging [IM] messages, etc.) that originate from other telecommunications terminals via a network such as the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), a wireless cellular network, a wireless local-area network, etc.
When telecommunications terminal 100 receives a message, it notifies its user of the message's arrival—or of the associated incoming call if one is occurring—by playing a “ringtone” (e.g., a tune, a series of beeps, etc.) via speaker 110 and by displaying visual information (e.g., text, an image, etc.) via display 111. Telecommunications terminal 100 might play a particular ringtone for all incoming messages, or a ringtone that is associated with a category of callers (e.g., a ringtone for business contacts, a ringtone for friends, a ringtone for family members, etc.), or a ringtone that is associated with an individual caller, etc. Similarly, telecommunications terminal 100 might display a text message (e.g., “Incoming Call”, “Incoming Call: Mom”, “Incoming Call: 555-555-5555”, etc.) or an image (e.g., an animated icon of a ringing telephone, a photo of the caller, etc.), or both, to indicate that there is an incoming message.
When the user of telecommunications terminal 100 ignores a notification of an incoming call, a record of the call is typically stored in a call log that indicates who the call originator is, what time the call was received, etc., thereby enabling the user to contact the originator at a later time if desired. Typically, a call log also keeps records of calls that are answered by the user and calls that are originated by the user.